_______________
Rob Pruitt Viagra Falls (2008)
Installation, Sand bags, plastic, water, electric pump and vast quantity of crushed Viagra pills
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Adam McEwen Birth Control Pills (2018)
‘The item is instantly recognizable, but again, freighted with a different set of meaning for each person. The actual objects, while being graphite facsimiles themselves, are ultimately alluding to real objects in everyday life. Indeed, the concept of verisimilitude runs throughout McEwen’s practice. What is real and what isn’t? Is that a picture of a birth control pill packet, or merely its graphite doppelgänger? If an object has no utilitarian purpose, but exists solely to evoke a specific memory or reaction from the viewer, can it still be considered real?’
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Beverly Fishman Pill Spill (2018)
‘In each of these works…I treat the museum or gallery space as a living organism by releasing pharmaceuticals into the institution’s interior.’
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Chemical X Caned Glass Windows (2019)
‘Artist Chemical X has taken 10,000 ecstasy tablets to make two enormous murals that look like something you would definitely want to have in your children’s room. irst, the artist and his team make a purchase in the “ingredients” wholesale and then make the pills in a house at a secret location. They use two pill presses, one to get the colours right in blanks, than they transfer the colour recipe over to the other press hidden away so that if the studio is raided there is no “contamination”. They have a large selection of old school embossing tools.’
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Jeremiah Johnson House Of Worship (2014)
‘Jeremiah Johnson found a new use for all of the empty pill bottles he’s collected since he was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis in 2001. Johnson’s latest work, ‘House of Worship’, is a model of a regional church constructed from his personal collection of empty prescription pill bottles.’
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Vladislavs Ribakovs Pills pills pills pills pills pills pilss (2024)
‘Depicting my struggles with medication and feeling trapped and hopeless.’
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Claes Oldenburg Emerald Pill (1977)
Enamel on cast aluminum, and stainless steel
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Jennifer Vasher Tylenol Room (2014)
‘Comprised of garlands of individually strung and knotted white pills, like a traditional pearl necklace. Over 550,000 aspirin went into the creation of this piece, which is architecturally defined by five 8 foot x 8 foot panels, a canopied ceiling, white chaise lounge chair, and the option for additional garlands configured to accommodate space.’
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Carsten Höller Pill Clock (2011)
‘The visitor is invited to pick up a pill and take it, to see whether it affects her or his relation to the space, the exhibition and reality in general. Note: these pills have been developed so as to ensure they contain no allergenic substances. However, they are not suitable for vegan visitors.’
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LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — ‘A Las Vegas mom whose son died because of drugs is upset about large pill stickers on the outside of a local hotel-casino. It’s only been a year since Debi Nadler lost her 28-year-old son, Brett. “He fought hard, he fought very hard, and he lost the battle,” Nadler said. “One pill can kill, one pill.” His pill addiction cost him his life and left Nadler devastated.
‘The anniversary of his death was just days ago, the same day she saw what appeared to be stickers of pills on the windows of the Palms Resort. “It was kind of like a big slap in my face to see a building with pills on the day I was doing my son’s unveiling,” Nadler said. “I wouldn’t even call it a piece of art, I call it something that is like a constant reminder to people who have lost their kids, to active users out there,” she said.’
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Peggy Kliafa Various (2013 – 2019)
Aluminum pills’ blisters, silicone, plexi glass
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Magnus Gjoen Tomorrow Never Knows (2023)
archival pigment inks on 310 GSM cotton rag
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Scott Blake Ecstacy Self-Portrait (201`2)
‘I collected all of the pill images from Dancsafe.org, a harm reduction organization promoting safety within the rave community.’
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Yin Xiunzhen Slow Release (2017)
‘The twelve meters long capsule-shaped installation called Slow Release is wrapped in 700 feet of red and white cloth donated by Muscovites. The medicine capsule references a brand-new generation of pills aimed to reduce the speed of release of the medicine into the body – to increase the therapeutic effect. The idea is furthermore accentuated by the fact that the visitors can freely enter the capsule which from the inside resembles one’s body and reconsider the connection between the fast pace of our lives, the wish for the quick effects (in this case – relief) and, on the contrary, the necessity to take a step back once in a while and take time for the continuing process of self-medication.’
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Fred Tomaselli Various (1993 – 2005)
‘Fred Tomaselli is one of the premiere psychedelic artists at work today. The California-raised, Brooklyn-based painter is best known for embedding actual pharmaceutical pills, hallucinogens and marijuana leaves in his glossy, resin-covered paintings. At root, Tomaselli’s art is about creating windows into alternative inner and outer realities—inspired by drugs, by 1970s conceptual art, by transcendental encounters with nature, by utopian movements, by the make-believe of Disneyland, which he could see from his childhood home.’
Hangover (2005)
49 Palms Oasis (1995)
Desert Bloom (2000)
Echo, Wow, and Flutter (2000)
Black and White All Over (1993)
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Catharina van de Ven White on White (2018)
Lasered aluminium, 20 acrylic resin domes, automotive paint
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Ben Ouaniche Pills Dissolving In Macro (2019)
‘Have you ever wondered what a pill looks like as it dissolves in your stomach? Although this video by filmmaker Ben Ouaniche for Macro Room doesn’t create the exact same conditions as your gut, the time-lapse video does show the spectacular ways pills quickly disintegrate in water as they bubble, ooze, expand, and disappear.’
________________
Jason Mecier Various (2011)
‘Jason Mecier’s life-like artwork is composed of differently colored prescription pills. The famous figures he has chosen to portray with the brightly colored pills are those who notorious for drug abuse. Some have even lost their lives to over-dosing.’
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Nan Goldin Drugs on the Rug (2016)
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Beejoir A Pill A Day (2017)
‘One pill a day’ a hand painted bronze that’s amazingly realistic until you try and pick it up as it weighs about 4 kilos.’
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Noubeda Carbone Disease (2019)
‘Disease by Noumeda Carbone is an art series of sculptures made out of empty pill capsules—9500 empty capsules, to be exact. Abstractly formed, each creation looks like some kind of disease rather than the cure they are supposed to be. They seem to suggest that taking medication can become a problem in and of itself. Even the colorful exterior attempts to hide the often dark truth of pill popping, which is symbolized by the black void inside.’
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Deathorgone glitchpills (2019)
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Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz Various (1964-1969)
‘In pursuit of Pure Form, the Polish artist known as “Witkacy” would consume LSD, amphetamine pills, sleeping pills, and other intoxicants before creating numerous studies of clients and friends for his portrait painting company; the mix of substances inducing different approaches to colour, technique, and composition. The resulting images are surreal — and occasionally horrific. Heads become disembodied busts, suspended in the night sky. Bodies are transformed into worms. Faces seep down the paper.’
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General Idea Various (1991)
‘In General Idea’s vocabulary, placebos serve as surrogates for art, functionless and soothing. Consistent with this notion is the deceptively cheerful appearance of the PLA©EBOs: Saturated color radiates from the liquid gloss of the pills’ surfaces, investing these stand-ins for both treatment and disease with an impertinent lightheartedness. A strange disorientation results from their gigantic proportions. The application of such dimensional shifts to everyday objects had already proven a powerful expressive tool for Pop artists, invariably promoting a sense of displacement. The PLA©EBO installations draw their unsettling effect from the impact of this device on our ingrained perceptual habits.’
Red (Cadmium) PLA©EBO
One Year of AZT
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Benjamin Eliasz Pill Paintings (2010)
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!Mediengruppe Bitnik Random Darknet Shopper (2014)
‘Operating out of Zurich and London, art collective !Mediengruppe Bitnik are best known for “Random Darknet Shopper”, a computer program built given bitcoin purchasing power and free reign to buy items from the dark web with a $100 weekly allowance and have them delivered to Kunst Halle gallery in St Gallen, Switzerland. The shopping bot, stationed within the exhibition space, bought 10 ecstasy pills from Germany for $48 and concealed in a DVD case> upon delivery they were put on display.’
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Loretta Lynn The Pill (1975)
‘Loretta Lynn has caused plenty of controversy over the course of her storied career in country music, including having — by her count — 14 songs banned from the radio. Arguably none of those caused a bigger stir, however, than her 1975 release, “The Pill,” which celebrates birth control and all the freedom it offers to married women who don’t want or can’t afford another baby.’
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Daniele Sigalot Einmal ist keinmal (2019)
‘Daniele Sigalot covers the ground with colorful medication pills, in which the perception of the audience challenged as if the ground is covered with crystal minerals.’
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Tina La Porta Various (2012 – 2013)
‘Artist Tina La Porta is a diagnosed schizophrenic. Since consuming pills have become a part of her daily routine they have become a central focus of her work. La Porta uses over the counter pills and coats them with resin, crushes them, places them into the palms of plaster casts of her own hand, photographs them and makes screen prints based on digitally altered images of them. “Pills are art supplies for me. I’m aesthetically attracted to them, and yet I’m also repulsed by them.”‘
Ecstasy (2013)
Mirror, Mirror (2013)
White Lies (2012)
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Unknown Teenage Acid Head (1967)
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Sarah Schönfeld All You Can Feel (2013)
‘Whether you’ve tried mind-altering substances or not one thing remains true: we all have an idea of what a drug feels like, be it imagined, anecdotal, or from direct exposure. So what might the effect of a drug look like? That was the question asked by artist Sarah Schoenfeld who had ample exposure to the realities of drugs while working in a Berlin nightclub. To answer the question she converted her photography studio into a laboratory and exposed legal and illegal liquid drug mixtures to film negatives. The resulting chemical reactions were then greatly magnified into large prints to form a body of work titled All You Can Feel.’
LSD
Melatonin
MDMA
Ecstacy
Valium
GHB
*
p.s. Hey. ** Jay, Hi. Dalkey Archive is crucial. I’m very happy that they’ve come back to life. For a long time they were the ‘it’ US publisher for adventurous fiction, sort like Grove Press had been in its heyday but without Grove’s overriding libidinal bent. The whole ‘AL” novel is actually pretty terrific. ‘Ada or Ardor’ is Nabokov’s toughie for sure, but if you love his writing, you should try it at least. Surely there are pdfs of it floating around. Lots of love back from good old here. ** Adem Berbic, You’ve never been to Amsterdam? Huh. That’s Flemish architecture central. Even photos of the place would clue you in. I don’t know that Stig Larsson book, but if it’s not in English, there you go. He can be good for sure. ** Dominik, Hi!!! Thank you for thanking. Gotcha on staying in Vienna. It’s going to take ages for the US to find its way back to what it was pre-monster. I suppose it never will entirely. I made it through with one cigarette to spare. A professional cuddler, nice ambition. Like a kidnappable version of those TikTok boys who film themselves offering strangers free hugs? Love erasing every trace of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ from the world or at least the internet and supermarket playlists and giving everyone who’s ever heard it amnesia, G. ** Laura, It is a rather obscure book. Why, I don’t know other than the obvious. Most fun? Uh, they put us up in a swank hotel and I had a suite on the top floor with a smoking balcony, and that was fun. Criticism of a work’s content are not to be taken seriously. Don’t know ‘The Pepsi Cola Addict’, I’ll look for/at it. Love back *whoosh* ** Carsten, The curse would appear to be defunct. Thanks, we see the film’s false start as a boon too, but that does hamper its conventional trajectory, which is a gift in the longer run. Um, I definitely felt the need to have a lawyer for the visa, due to language issues and just wanting to do what was required precisely. It was a hassle as far as gathering the needed materials, but it was pretty easy all in all. And now that I have the new visa, which is an actual card rather than a stamp in my passport, it will supposedly be easier to get a longer term resident visa on the next go round in a year. France seems pretty open with visas. Definitely as compared to the US where it doesn’t even seem worth trying at the current time. But I’m pretty sure if I was younger it might’ve been harder. I think I seem pretty harmless. I think we are either finished with the new script or a few details away from being finished. We’ve been working on it for a year now. I’m just waiting for Zac’s sign off, and then starts the hard part: finding a producer and funding and all of that potential hell. ** _Black_Acrylic, Great, great news, Ben! So you can carry on doing what you have been doing to bolster your health and strength? So very happy to hear that, my friend! ** Jamie, Jamie, old pal, there you are! I’d had my eyes peeled for you at the Brussels screening, but you’re in LA of all places! What are you doing there? Are you and it getting along famously? Sucks I’m not one of my trips there. I probably won’t get there until October/Halloween. I’m doing good. Basically getting the film out and about has been my life for the past year, but now we’re starting to wind down with that and preparing for it to live the rest of its life via streaming and on BluRay. All’s fine. And you? Lots of love back! ** Steve, Yes, Dalkey published the final Robbe-Grillet. When I was a kid I was obsessed with this TV show called ‘The Soupy Sales Show’ which was kind of much less fanciful precursor to ‘PeeWee Herman’ in a way. He (Soupy) used to get in trouble all the time. Once he told the kids watching the show to sneak into their parents wallets and purses and take out all the green paper things and send them to him, and a lot of kids did, and it was a big scandal. ** Hugo, Hi. Nice seeing you too. Sorry for my usual pre-screening nervousness and distractedness. Hugs back. ** HaRpEr //, My pleasure. The London possibility is definitely very far from cemented, so, yeah, back burner for now. In agreement with you, as you said, although I do understand that a lot of people want and even need those kinds of books — people who look to books for things that you and I don’t. As you can imagine, when I was first publishing my novels there was quite a big pushback from gays who thought that my not wanting to be the spokesperson for ‘my kind’ was very selfish of me. ** Corey, Hey, Corey! I’ve been thinking about you what with all the stuff going on down there, as you can surely imagine. I’ll ask my Swedish friends if there’s a cockney Swedish. Mekas is a top model obviously. Thanks for the link. I’ll go look at your teacher’s work when I’m outta here. Great about the growth of the alternative magazine and your own zines and videos. I hope I’m here in October when you come, i.e, before I head off for my Halloween explorations in LA. Great to see you! ** Okay, More ‘pills’ for you today. See you tomorrow.
Now available in North America 
Nope, never. My unfounded impression of Amsterdam is that it’s one of those places where people are Truman Show-style polite and orderly in a way that’d get under my skin, like Denmark — I feel a little ill at ease anywhere I couldn’t ride my bike like I’m trying to cause a mass casualty event, which is de rigeur in London. But, as above, totally unfounded.
I’ve just ordered the Larsson book, so I’ll report back in due course. Hopefully the translation does it justice, but I’m really in no position to judge its fidelity (actually one of my housemates is Swedish, but they can’t speak French, so we’re still stuck.)
Off the back of some of the art in the above, I saw a thing yesterday for a coffee table art book of pictures of coke bricks taken from the dark web. It sort of pissed me off — I felt like it fits in this segment of London culture that’s as concerned with parading signifiers of coolness and edginess as it is with presenting work on its own terms. Is that a reasonable reaction, or am I just being crotchety?
Back in the late 90s I was starting art school and there was a brand new pill on the market called the Mitsubishi, which was an Ecstasy tablet with remarkably high MDMA content. Came stamped with the automobile logo and it was a cultural phenomenon. Heralded a resurgence in euphoric House music that took the place of the then-everywhere Techno. Thomas Bangallter’s Roule label was very much at the forefront of this sound. When I discovered conceptual art and House music, that was the Mitsubishi era. Ah the 90s, it was crazy time alright.
Hi!!
Once again, same with Hungary. Obviously, this change is wonderful, but Orbán ruled the country for 16 years – healing will take a long, long time.
I’ll have to go investigate those TikTok boys. But yes, I’d say so, haha.
Bohemian Rhapsody overload? If I could erase one song from existence, it would be the original Forever Young.
Love debating whether to take a pill that would make his deepest, most sincere wish come true, Od.
This makes me glad that I’m not taking any meds of any kind. Some freaky art though.
Re. visas: sounds reasonable, what you experienced that is. Except for that 7 hour wait, that’s inhumane. Well my U.S. experience was during the Obama years. I’m sure it’s hell now, & who’d even want to try? But America’s immigration system has been fucked for a very long time. Back in 2010 when I did it, getting a student visa was probably the smoothest, easiest way in. I have lots of wild stories from the gray zone area of loopholes & contradictions, which I’ll save for when we meet again face to face.
Do you & Zac evenly split the work of finding producers & financiers? Wishing you good tailwinds this time around.
I’m still on my Les Blank trip & saw the day you did on him here a while back. “Dry Wood” was a great discovery, & I can’t believe it took me this long to catch “The Blues Accordin’ to Lightnin’ Hopkins”. Hopkins is easily one of my top five musicians of all time, & Blank’s film is a gorgeous portrait. “Sworn to the Drum: A Tribute to Francisco Aguabella” is another gem, & I’ll leave you with this beautiful quote from it:
“Without rhythm there is nothing. Nobody can walk without rhythm: No one starts with the right foot, then suddenly switches to the left! Nobody! You talk with a beat: this & that, this & that. And when you walk, you walk with a beat, & you gesture with a beat. Without rhythm there’s nothing. Without music, even less.”
Hi Dennis,
what a beautiful post, thank you!
My long-term relationship with pills/medication endet just around new year, when – after 19 years, starting when I had just turned 14 – I got this thing: certain antidepressants can apparently cause (hypo)mania as a rare side effect and when this happens, you can no longer take them. So for the last couple of months my brain has to face the world (and itself) without chemical alteration. That was quite overwhelming at the beginning, but the realisation that my brain developped into adulthood without a single day without medication was weird, too. I’ll just wait and see how it all turn out, but for now, things are going pretty okay.
I’m excited to see RT in Berlin next week, and I hope you and Zac have a great time there!
It feels right that in “All You Can Feel,” Melatonin and Valium are pale grey circles.
Did Soupy and his station get sued?
Hey Dennis. As a long time pill-taker in both medical and recreational ways, and as someone who even enjoys waiting for a prescription in the pharmacy so I can browse the medications behind the counter, I love today’s post. As _Black_Acrylic mentioned up above, I also fondly remember Mitsubishi Es and their rejuvenating effect on the rave scene of that time.
I’ve been mostly good, thanks. Hannah and I now have two kids, which is oddly more enjoyable than having one, but tiring. We’re in LA as Hannah’s been teaching a couple of classes at UCLA and we’ll be here for another 4 months. Any recommendations? We went to Universal Studios last weekend and I experienced my first dark rides, which I thought you’d like. Transformers was any favourite. Maybe one day, we can actually go to Parc Asterix, as was planned many moons ago until I got sick.
Well done for plugging away with the RT. It seems to me, from an outside perspective, it’s been getting quite a positive engaged response? I’m glad it’s going to be on some streaming sites soonish, cos I’d like another fix of it.
Hope you have a good day. I still find the different time zone thing to be a fun novelty.
Love, Jamie
I sometimes wonder if the Zoloft I include in my daily cocktail makes the oestrogen happier.
I’ve never heard of Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz. I was quite interested in Henri Michaux at one point who had his own mescaline experiments, somewhere between visual art, calligraphy, and poetry, and have been thinking I should try his writing. Ever read him?
Oh for sure, when I was a kid and didn’t read/watch the same way I do today, I searched out every piece of trans media that I could find. I remember finding a dusty copy of ‘Myra Breckinridge’ in a charity shop and reading it for educational purposes which must have given me some very funny ideas haha.
I watched so many shitty films in private. Made for tv stuff about scandalous sex changes etc. Often exploitative.
Then when I started my lifelong obsession with John Waters at fifteen it changed everything for me in terms of the possibility of the person you could be if you were queer e.g. a bit disturbed. I didn’t get on very well with the gay adjacent kids at school because they thought I was too disturbed and I found it difficult to relate to them, so John Waters sort of saved my life. For the record, I found trouble relating to a lot of straight kids even more.
hi Dennis!
as someone w a chronic illness which requires medication i def have thoughts and feelings re: this one… some of it felt sort of cheap? like listen, Russian guy, the decision between extended release meds and their regular version is usually v technical and unrelated to wanting to feel amazing fast or all the time or whatever. there’s no metaphor there for our rushed consumeristic lives lmao.
i loved the blister pack that looked like pearls? alas there was no commentary on that one so for all i know she was going for ‘pills are superfluous’ but i had this emotional reaction uh… like either illness or treatment or both could be this pure, rich ornament or whatever, which is a nice change of pace. it’s actually weird how a) personally offended and b) entitled to your life story ppl can get when they watch you whip out your pillbox in public. like evidence of an otherwise fairly invisible illness is this shameful, dehumanising thing. so the pearls, very nice lol.
obvi pill art by people who understand what it’s like to need meds or who’ve done loads of recreational drugs is my fav. the guy w ulcerative colitis (?) building a minichurch out of empty pill boxes did a lot for me… like we may not suffer from the same affliction but that’s so much the hope and failure and the W of dealing with smth unwanted you can’t just wish away. i feel i baseline understand him. and the woman who dissolved all those drugs in water? ugh, gorgeous. who knew Ecstasy would look so weirdly evil lol.
in sort of other news, i’m still vaguely bummed out i only just discovered Assisted Living, like yea it’s weird but feels like it should have been 6 degrees of half of what i read, add to that all the time i’ve spent in Sweden… i’m always a bit on my toes when it comes to books much older than mine which even remotely touch on similar subjects, like let it not have been done word for word over 30 years ago lol
you got a suite w a smoking balcony? extremely bougee and at least circumstantial evidence of your arrival. well deserved, Dennis. someone should have like domestically papped you a bit tho, idk why i’m into pictures of ppl smoking in balconies but it is what it is. maybe someone did pap you? ^_^
also hear the script is almost almost done now, hope Zac is right chuffed and you guys get a chill producer this time — a sweet producer even. is that a thing? lol. you really should make me man on bus one day or whatever, you know. if i actually get out of this whole lot of blergh obvi. both halves of this clause would be a lot of fun =)
hope you can get ahold of The Pepsi Cola Addict! i believe there were like a dozen extant copies before David Tibet happily intervened, since then it’s findable again. and sort of true to the OG version and stuff, what more could we ask for. let me know what you think if you do score it!
anyway, i’m def not purchasing biographical you —kinky and full-circle as that might be, it’s better if you just tell me whatever if you want to. but since i’m between reads, i’m now curling up w that book of yours w the interviews etc? it’s a good time! and astaghfirullah what a cursed convo you had w this v famous actor who was about to become way more famous, like my God was he a dullard, and also sort of… shockingly callous about kids w polio? wtf. you were being p mean to him in that gentle, leading way of yours and idt he could tell at all and just lmao, slay, it was so good ^_^
think most of the =o reactions i’m getting so far are content-related, or ppl say ‘that’s literary fiction’ like nothing good can be said about it, or ‘that’s bubblegum fiction’, idem. but i’m p hungry for someone to tell me if they think i’m being a sappy child, which i really don’t want to be =D
anyway, it’s Half Man and bed for me now. think i’m scratching myself in my sleep bc i’ve suddenly got this almost welt going down my arm and if that mf scars i’m going to crash out.
say smth that’s been on your mind today? i’ve been thinking a bit of idk inverted consequences? like fires dying of ashes, stuff like that.
love ya!
Good to hear the Brussels trip went well. I never get the impression it’s a hotbed of edgy contemporary art. But on my visits I loved the food and beer, and more traditional museums.
Lots of fine pills today. Do you know Hugh Hayden’s Fairy Tale?
https://www.instagram.com/p/DDjAVOeMVQ_/
Crazy week. More later…
Bill